Search form

NGOs celebrate creation of Rapporteurship for Human Rights Defenders

Washington DC, April 4, 2011 – During its latest session of hearings, which concluded last Friday, the Washington based Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) announced the creation of a Rapporteurship on the situation of human rights defenders. Commissioner José Orozco Henríquez of Mexico will be the Rapporteur.

06.April.2011

Washington DC, April 4, 2011 – During its latest session of hearings, which concluded last Friday, the Washington based Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) announced the creation of a Rapporteurship on the situation of human rights defenders. Commissioner José Orozco Henríquez of Mexico will be the Rapporteur.

In a press conference, Commissioner Orozco stated that this specialized office is being created to highlight the Commission’s concern and draw attention to the increased attack on human rights defenders. The Rapporteurship also aims to support the important work carried out by human rights defenders (as well as judicial personnel, that also fall under the Rapporteur’s mandate), in order to ensure that the rule of law is respected.

The 94 co-signing organizations (22 NGOs and the TDT Network, which is made up of 72 organizations) welcome the Rapporteurship’s creation, which was explicitly requested in a hearing held before the Commission on March 29.

We also reiterate our concern for the continuing harassment of human rights defenders as well as its increase in some countries. Attacks by state actors or groups that act with state support or tolerance have continued. New forms of harassment by organized crime and companies with economic interests in the region have also appeared. Among other offenses, the defenders have been victims of monitoring by state intelligence agents, information theft, improper use of criminal law against them, and attacks against their lives and integrity, as well as those of their families.

We therefore trust that the Rapporteurship will contribute to strengthening the Inter-American Commission’s crucial role in tracking and monitoring the work of human rights defenders in the region.

The IACHR now has eight Rapporteurships on topics including the rights of women, indigenous peoples, freedom of expression, persons deprived of liberty, Afro-descendants and racial discrimination, migrant workers, and the rights of the child.